Sorkin's father, it turns out, was an IP lawyer. And "my knowledge about patents came entirely from him."

The show opened on Broadway in December 2007, starring Jimmi Simpson as Mr. Farnsworth and Hank Azaria as Mr. Sarnoff. And its script is, true to Sorkin form, only marginally historically accurate. (The play depicts Farnsworth being vanquished by Sarnoff -- when the real Farnsworth defeated his rival in court, receiving a $1 million payout from RCA for the purchase of his TV patents.) Today, one of the play's lasting legacies is this scathing review from The New York Times theater critic Ben Brantley:

You're likely to leave "The Farnsworth Invention" feeling that you have just watched an animated Wikipedia entry, fleshed out with the sort of anecdotal scenes that figure in "re-enactments" on E! channel documentaries and true-crime shows.